Social and Cultural Theory Since 1900

This course is a graduate level survey of social and cultural theory since 1900. The purpose of the course is to introduce students to the key theoretical debates that have dominated social science and humanities scholarship over the past 150 years. Each section of the course will include a summary text that provides historical and scholarly context as well as a selection of exemplary readings that the class will discuss in detail. By the end of this course:

Students will be able to outline the broad history of social and cultural theory since 1900.

Through comparing and contrasting the major theoretical strands of social and cultural theory, students will be able to construct a visual model that highlights key themes and turning points in debates.

Students will be able to identify when and summarize how current literature in the social sciences and humanities uses and/or transforms social and cultural theories.

By comparing and contrasting the philosophical and historical contexts of debates over social and cultural theory over the past 150 years, students will be able evaluate the methodological and ethical implications of the various theoretical models.

Students will be able to explain how theory is both relevant and responsive to applied practice.

In a more general sense, students will develop and refine skills to comprehend, interpret, analyze, and compare scholarly writing.

Week 5

Benjamin, Walter. “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility: Second Version.” In The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media, 19–55. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press’, 2008.